Big cats
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Snow leopard ( Panthera uncia ) |
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| Pantherinae | ||||||||||||
| Pocock , 1917 |
The big cats (Pantherinae) are a subfamily of the cats (Felidae). The term “large” indicates that the larger representatives of the cats are in this group. However, the criterion for belonging is not the body size, but the actual relationship, which is determined by DNA analyzes and morphological details such as the structure of the hyoid bone . Therefore, some larger cats like the puma and cheetah do not belong to the group of big cats.
Genera and species
The following genera and species belong to the big cats:
- Genus Real Big Cats ( Panthera )
- Tiger ( P. tigris )
- Jaguar ( P. onca )
- Lion ( P. leo )
- Leopard ( P. pardus )
- Snow leopard ( P. uncia )
- Genus Neofelis
- Clouded leopard ( N. nebulosa )
- Sunda Clouded Leopard ( Neofelis diardi ) (G. Cuvier, 1823) (formerly considered a subspecies of Clouded Leopard)
The affiliation of the marble cat ( Pardofelis marmorata ) to this group is controversial. In the traditional view, it was assigned to the small cats , in the meantime a connection to the big cats has been suspected, but recent molecular genetic studies suggest a close relationship to the Asian golden cats , so that modern systematics classify them again into the small cats (Felinae). For more details on the system, see the cat system .
The black panther is not a separate species, but a black coloration ( melanism ) of the leopard and also of the jaguar.
Systematics
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Relationships of the big cats according to Johnson et al., Nyakatura and Bininda-Emonds and Tseng et al ..
Fur drawings
All big cats have fur markings. Leopard, jaguar, snow leopard, clouded leopard and Neofelis diardi have spots, the tiger has stripes. In the lion, the spots are mostly only present in the young animals. Sometimes, however, these spots remain in adult lions.
Roar
Big cats differ from their smaller relatives in the structure of their hyoid bone. This is made up of small bones that act as "fasteners" for the tongue muscle in the cat's throat. This trait was originally associated with the ability to roar. However, recent studies show that roaring is related to other anatomical features, especially a special formation of the larynx . This is characterized in the lion, tiger, leopard and jaguar by very long vocal folds and a thick pad made of elastic fabric, which allows these species to roar. The snow leopard, clouded leopard and other cat species do not have these characteristics and therefore cannot roar.
See also
literature
- DE Wilson, DM Reeder: Mammal Species of the World. Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005, ISBN 0-8018-8221-4 .
- Ronald M. Nowak: Walker's Mammals of the World. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999, ISBN 0-8018-5789-9 .
- ME Sunquist, FC Sunquist: Family Felidae (Cats). In: DE Wilson, RA Mittermeier (ed.): Handbook of the Mammals of the World. Volume 1: Carnivores. Lynx Edicions, 2009, ISBN 978-84-96553-49-1 , pp. 128-130.
- John Seidensticker, Susan Lumpkin: Big Cats. Jahr-Verlag, Hamburg, ISBN 0-86438-233-2 .
supporting documents
- ^ Johnson, WE; Eizirik, E .; Pecon-Slattery, J .; Murphy, WJ; Antunes, A .; Teeling, E .; O'Brien, SJ (2006). The Late Miocene radiation of modern Felidae: a genetic assessment. Science. 311 (5757): 73-77. doi: 10.1126 / science.1122277
- ↑ Katrin Nyakatura, Olaf RP Bininda-Emonds: Updating the evolutionary history of Carnivora (Mammalia): a new species-level supertree complete with divergence time estimates. In: BMC Biology. Volume 10, No. 12, 2012, pp. 1-31.
- ^ Z. Jack Tseng, Xiaoming Wang, Graham J. Slater, Gary T. Takeuchi, Qiang Li, Juan Liu, Guangpu Xie: Himalayan fossils of the oldest known pantherine establish ancient origin of big cats. Proceedings of the Royal Society B - Biological Sciences vol. 281 no. 1774 20132686, November 2013. DOI: 10.1098 / rspb.2013.2686
